Posted on 12/08/2005 6:54:56 AM PST by jackbenimble
(CNSNews.com) - Illegal aliens who work under borrowed, stolen or fraudulent Social Security numbers could collect retirement benefits based on their illegal earnings as the result of a Bush administration plan. Critics charge the federal government has grossly underestimated the cost of the proposal, which they believe could run be billions of dollars per year.
Congress is expected to vote on some combination of proposed changes to immigration laws as early as next week, according to sources working with the House Homeland Security and Judiciary committees. While members have not been able to reach agreement on the details of a temporary or "guest worker" program advocated by President Bush, the White House might use the legislative opportunity to seek approval for an International Social Security Agreement with Mexico, something it has wanted for more than two years.
Mark Kirkorian, executive director of the Center for Immigration Studies, told Cybercast News Service that the arrangements, usually called "totalization agreements," with industrialized countries like Canada, the United Kingdom and even France are beneficial. But those benefits, he argued, would not come from an agreement with Mexico.
"The point to a totalization agreement is for two advanced countries that occasionally send corporate transferees from one country to the next for a two or three year stint to be able to reconcile their respective retirement systems," Kirkorian said. "It's not for a third world country that sends millions of peasants into a developed country to take advantage of; there's a complete mismatch, an imbalance."
Kirkorian points out a number of differences between the U.S. and Mexican Social Security systems including:
Workers are vested in the U.S. system in 10 years versus 24 years in Mexico;
The U.S. pays greater benefits to lower income workers whereas Mexico pays out only the premiums paid in, plus accrued interest; and
Most Mexican workers avoid their country's Social Security system by working in the "underground economy," while most U.S. workers have Social Security taxes automatically collected from their wages.
The U.S. has entered into totalization agreements with 20 countries since 1978. The Social Security Administration (SSA) describes the arrangements on its website:
"[These] agreements have two main purposes. First, they eliminate dual Social Security taxation -- the situation that occurs when a worker from one country works in another country and is required to pay Social Security taxes to both countries on the same earnings," the SSA site explains. "Second, the agreements help fill gaps in benefit protection for workers who have divided their careers between the United States and another country."
Congress does not have to give approval for the totalization agreements, but lawmakers are given the opportunity to vote them down. SSA Commissioner Jo Anne Barnhart explained the benefits of totalization for U.S. employers and employees during her Sept. 11, 2003 testimony to the House Judiciary Subcommittee on Immigration, Border Security and Claims.
"Without totalization the combined Social Security tax rate that U.S. employers and employees working in foreign countries must pay often approaches 40 percent or more of total payroll," Barnhart testified.
In March of 2003, the SSA's Office of the Chief Actuary estimated that a totalization agreement with Mexico would cost the U.S. $78 million in the first year, growing to $650 million (in constant 2002 dollars) by 2050. That determination assumed that the initial number of newly eligible Mexican recipients would be equal to the 50,000 beneficiaries then living in Mexico, and that the eligible number would grow to only 300,000 over the next 48 years.
But the agency now known as the Government Accountability Office (GAO) GAO report disputed that estimate.
"[T]his proxy figure does not directly consider the estimated millions of current and former unauthorized workers and family members from Mexico and appears small in comparison with those estimates," the GAO determined. "The estimate also inherently assumes that the behavior of Mexican citizens would not change and does not recognize that an agreement could create an additional incentive for unauthorized workers to enter the United States to work and maintain documentation to claim their earnings under a false identity."
Kirkorian believes those would be the unintended consequences of the president's proposed "guest worker" program.
"If the president gets his way and [those illegal aliens are] legalized, and he submits this totalization agreement to Congress," Kirkorian warned, "then all of the illegal aliens who get this 'amnesty' that he wants, get to count all of their Social Security payments when they were illegal toward their eventual retirement."
Barnhart told the congressional subcommittee that such an outcome could not happen.
"As is the case with our existing agreements, a totalization agreement with Mexico would not alter current law on this issue," Barnhart testified. "Totalization agreements do not have any effect on the prohibition against payment of benefits to illegal aliens in the United States."
But if Congress approves the president's "guest worker" plan, the "adjusted" status of previously illegal employees would mean that they would no longer be excluded from eligibility for Social Security payments.
"What they want is for illegal aliens who 'adjust' to some kind of legal status to be able to count their illegal work toward Social Security," Kirkorian said. "That's not up for contention, that's just a fact. The Social Security Administration negotiated the agreement, already, with Mexico."
A March 2003 report by the Social Security Administration's Office of the Inspector General (SSA-OIG) validates Kirkorian's concern.
"SSA's practice allows non-citizens to work illegally in the U.S. economy for a number of years, eventually acquire a valid SSN and have these earnings posted to their valid SSNs, and then receive [Social Security] benefits as a result of those earnings," the inspector general reported. "SSA does not consider the work-authorization status of the individual when they earned the wages; it only considers whether the individual can prove he or she paid Federal Insurance Contribution Act (FICA) taxes as part of this work."
Data from the 2000 Census indicate that 9.1 million Mexican citizens are living in the United States, 4.8 million of them illegally. The SSA-OIG report speculated about the impact that those illegal aliens could have if they became eligible for U.S. Social Security benefits.
"If these Mexican non-citizens are also working in the United States illegally, and an amnesty and/or totalization agreement occurs," the report warned, "SSA potentially may need to reinstate a large volume of [Social Security taxes paid under false or fraudulent account numbers] based on earlier unauthorized work."
Marti Dinerstein, president of Immigration Matters, also criticized the SSA in a September 2004 report entitled "Social Security 'Totalization' - Examining a Lopsided Agreement with Mexico," for using Canada as the model for its Mexican totalization cost estimates.
"The estimated number of Canadians living in the United States is 820,000," Dinerstein wrote. "Given the fact that a totalization agreement would cover not just Mexican workers but also their spouses and dependents, it is highly likely that over time, potentially millions of people would receive U.S. Social Security benefits and the cost would be in the billions of dollars."
"It's pretty ludicrous, frankly," Kirkorian concluded. "Mexico is just not the kind of country that you should be having this kind of agreement with."
The White House did not return calls seeking comment for this article.
All the actuaries in the world are not worth spit if you start with flawed assumptions and that is exactly the criticism of the SSA's projections.
The GAO is one of the very few organizations within the entire Federal Government that actually has a decent and credible track record. Somebody already posted this but apparently you missed it. Here is what they said:
In testimony on September 11, 2003, the GAO challenged the SSA’s methodology for estimating the costs of an agreement with Mexico. The methodology failed to take into account the estimated five million illegal alien Mexican workers in the United States, Mexicans now living in Mexico who earlier worked illegally in the United States, the fact that the agreement likely would make family members living in Mexico eligible for benefits that they are not currently entitled to, and the effects of a proposed new guest worker agreement. Also, the GAO found that there was no effort to systematically study the record keeping of the Mexican authorities who would be partners in the program to assure the validity of information received from that source.
In other words, the Social Security Administrations actuaries badly blew it. They left at least 5 million recipients out of their actuarial calculations.
CIS not a credible source??? Better tell that to your Republican congress. They testify for hearings all the time.
This "utopian agenda" you mentioned is putting the USA in very, very grave danger.
We should be building a ROBUST ABM system, a real anti-bioweapon defense, and we should be upgading our strategic capabilities. The world is getting much more dangerous, and China aims to become the sole superpower.
Our dollars are instead going to African black hole money pits, domestic welfare and gobs of other global welfare programs. We will be canceling the Joint Strike Fighter and the DD(X) program, and we have cut back on the F-22 (yet again) and are canceling and scaling abck other Defense programs because . . .
. . .because we "can't afford them". Somehow, we "afford" BILLIONS in welfare, global charity, and we cancel foreign debt owed to us.
At some point, the dereliction of duty boundary will be crossed. Our "leaders" seem to be aiding in the destruction of the USA.
If the illegal working in the US in 2002 under a phony SS number didn't keep his check stubs, what makes you think that the illegal worker in '92, '82,'72, '62 kept his? The further you go back in time, the less likely documentation exists.
My wife got her notice of the annual "increase" in her Social Security payment. She gets $30 more due to inflation LESS a $40 increase in Medicare payment. Luckily we are not totally dependent upon SS, but how about the others less fortunate? Now Bush comes up with this? You can bet these illegals, because of their Third World environment back home, will need a lot more Medicare services once they are covered. The current SS retirees will get screwed over just as much as the taxpaying workers.
Bush proposed plans to "save" SS. He didn't get them passed, so I guess now he just intends to kill it instead. This sure as Hell will do it.
Another trap not so obvious in these Shamnesty plans is that once legalized, these people will move up the economic ladder, displacing higher paid Americans. And who will fill the vacuum of the lower-paid jobs just vacated? The next tsunami of illegals who will patiently wait for another "one-time" amnesty.
The real problem is that neither party wants to recognize the elephant in the living room: the corrupt oligarchy that rules Mexico. Until they are forced to clean up their act, by sanctions or otherwise, they will continue to use us as a relief valve and we will perpetually be the Dutch Boy trying to plug the dike. It's time we started leaning on them instead of being on the defensive.
I'm sure that Congress will consider their testimony. Even the dems get to pick some that they will hear from.
I've read several of their studies and they are doing a better job with this issue then almost anybody. There work is very well documented with their sources referenced and verifiable. Here is an excellent example: The High Cost of Cheap Labor. Their work is far more believable then the nonsense that flows out of the National Chamber of Commerce where they just pluck a number out of their butt and expect us all to believe their self-serving assertions that we are going to be short by 10 million laborers by 2020 without documenting their methodology or their assumptions.
Social Security Ping!
Please FReepmail me if you want on or off this South Texas/Mexico ping list.
OTOH, most of the deportem crowd disagrees with it.
India workers are already paying into Social Security. I read that in an India paper in the last year or two. Bush is a traitor. We can't afford 3 more years of this man.
Start building the fence.
It should be made a felony for Criminals who overstay their visas and Invaders.
I believe we should give amnesty to these poor CRIMINALS or INVADERS.
This should be a 2 week amnesty to get the heck out of our Country.
The ones who ignore this amnesty should be buried in a tent city jail and fined $10,000 or buried elsewhere.
All aiders and abettors of these CRIMINALS or INVADERS should get 1 year in a tent city jail and a $10,000 fine for each CRIMINAL aided.
Those in government should be the first ones charged.
Yes, the chamber is a sell out to their big corporate buddies. And they are led by GROVER NORQUIST, the biggest GOP border sell out there is. Don't overlook his influence as the white house "Point man" on immigration.
And CIS is as good as gold.
Downsize the Illegals!
Another oral-affection classic from our Stammerer-in-Chief :
Mark Krikorian's (correct spelling) Theory of Attrition is an alternative to a Shamnesty Guestworker Plan. It is essentially Tom Tancredo's approach to dealing with the illegals who are already here. Essentially you make life miserable for them with steady workplace enforcement and they self-deport over a period of years. I agree with this approach. If you believe Krikorian is right, why are you always shilling for a shamnesty?
"I don't understand what people have against Bush on the borders. Bush has done everything he possibly could on the borders."
Pour yourself a stiff drink and read CAFTA, read NAFTA.
Bush 'normalized" SS with Mexico thus enabling Mexicans to tap into SS.
He's talking with a forked tongue when he tels us he is against "Amnesty"....yet at the same time he wants to try to "normalize" the illegals who are here in our country now.
You can't have it both ways.
He hires the sock puppet Cherntoff who says it's too "inconvenient" and not "feasable" to deport those illegals whom are here in our country right now.
I could go on and on, but you get the idea.
"I want to know what Bush hasn't done that people want him to do on the border. Bush has made major improvements over Clinton on the border. Bush has done so much on the border that people that go after him are making it personal because except for the guest worker program which is going nowhere his policies on the border have been great. We are catching more illegals today than ever before. We have caught 5 million illegals in the last 4 years on the border far more than under Clinton who let them get through."
Ummmm, illegal crossings are up 25% since 911.
Don't misunderstand me. I am against any amnesty plan no matter what Bush callse it. I a also against this totalization plan that only rewards illegals for life with tax dollars that my children are going to have to pay.
We are soon coming to a crossroads in this country where the honest, hard working average American is going to say "enough". I hope it's not violent but if it is the only people to blame are those that have allowed millions of illegals to tarnish the true meaning of American sovereignty and citizenship.
Those reasons that Krikorian used confirm what the C of C has said all along. Another of Krikorians reasons confirmed Bush's Feb 04 statement that Americans do't have the will to deport.
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